


back to the wind

by dicaeopolis



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: (they're almost out of university), M/M, POV consistency: 0, Post-Canon, Roadtrip, THE TITLE IS FROM LIFE IS A HIGHWAY BC I HAVE GIVEN UP ON THE CONCEPT OF TITLES IN GENERAL, aesthetics: 100000, unlike the last time I posted a 'roadtrip fic' this one is actually about roadtrips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-12
Updated: 2016-12-12
Packaged: 2018-09-08 00:39:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8822806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dicaeopolis/pseuds/dicaeopolis
Summary: Some snapshots of Kuroo, and Daichi, and autumn, and wanderlust, and the open road.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kevinkevinson](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kevinkevinson/gifts).



> ME AND CASEY ENABLED EACH OTHER INTO THIS HER PART IS [HERE](https://twitter.com/kevinkevinsonnn/status/808139184389099521)/[HERE](http://kevinkevinson.tumblr.com/post/154358621655/are-you-serious-says-daichi-i-know-right-we) AND IT IS BEAUTIFUL AND I AM OVERWHELMED. (i also referenced [this art](http://kevinkevinson.tumblr.com/post/134442288195/ive-had-this-headcanon-for-awhile-that-daichi) of hers at one point. bc it's real.) and thanks [amber](http://www.twitter.com/ambyguity_) for last-minute betaing!
> 
> I HAVEN'T BEEN POSTING MUCH LATELY BUT! THE SEMESTER'S ALMOST OVER, FOLKS. and just y'all wait til i'm free. i have Many Plans.
> 
> promo posts are on [twitter](https://twitter.com/dickaeopolis/status/808117929376092160) and [tumblr](http://vivasimplemindedness.tumblr.com/post/154354600018/back-to-the-wind-dicaeopolis-haikyuu)!

“Tetsurou! Was your train ride difficult? Have you eaten yet? Daichi’s almost done with breakfast-” The woman’s voice is muffled for a moment as she wraps Kuroo in a hug that smells like her jasmine shampoo. Kuroo hugs her back, smiling down at her greying head. He loves Daichi’s mom. “-and I have snacks and Gatorade for you boys, you can get dehydrated when you’re on the road for a long time, you know-”

“Mom, it’s early,” complains another, deeper voice. Kuroo looks up - and there’s Daichi himself, trudging out the doorway of the small house with a commuter mug in his hand. He’s dressed and his backpack is slung over his shoulder, but he’s still rubbing sleep out of his eyes.

“You should’ve been up hours ago!” Mrs. Sawamura chides him. It’s barely six, but the woman is alert and energetic, unlike her son. “You boys catch up, I’m going to put these in the back-” She hoists up the cooler of food from the driveway and heads around to the back of Daichi’s car, waving off Kuroo’s offer of help.

Daichi stands there for a moment, blinking at Kuroo in the grey light of dawn. Kuroo offers his fist. “Nice to see you off a Skype screen.”

Daichi grunts and bumps him with the hand that isn’t holding his coffee. “Nice to see you without your hellion roommate in the background.”

“Oikawa is a _delight.”_

“You’re _both_ hellions.”

“Your _mom_ doesn’t think I’m a hellion.”

“She just doesn’t know you well enough.”

“Let me have this, Sawamura.” Kuroo shoves his hands into the pockets of his jacket and raises an eyebrow at Daichi. “Adults never think I’m a good guy, you know.”

“They _shouldn’t._ You’re a menace.” He’s too sleepy to sound like he means it, and Kuroo’s already holding back a smile as he argues back,

“I just _look_ like a troublemaker. I’m actually responsible and trustworthy.”

Daichi lets out an unimpressed snort. Daichi has never been much impressed by Kuroo. It’s part of why why Kuroo likes him so much.

Daichi is grumpy in the mornings - something Kuroo didn’t know about him. As they climb up into the front of the car, he’s still blinking away sleep cobwebs. Kuroo pulls the passenger door shut, but before Daichi can follow suit, a hand catches the driver’s door and Mrs. Sawamura stands there, hands on her hips. “Daichi, you’re going to be doing all the driving, so make sure to take breaks when you need, yes?”

“Yes, Mom.” As an aside, he mutters to Kuroo, “I still can’t believe we’re nearly out of college and you still don’t have your driver’s license.”

“I grew up in _Tokyo,”_ Kuroo points out. “Besides, Sawamura, that’s what I’ve got you for.”

“That _is_ what he’s got you for,” Mrs. Sawamura adds sternly, “so he’s your responsibility now. Take care of him, Daichi, you hear?”

“I hear,” Daichi agrees dutifully.

She smacks her son on the shoulder and then shuts the driver’s side door. Daichi rubs his shoulder a little, but seems resigned to the blow. Must be all those years with Sugawara.

“Take care of me,” Kuroo echoes to him.

“Piss off.”

Kuroo leans back and grins at the ceiling of the car. “I missed this,” he says.

Daichi grumbles a little and fumbles with his keys, his fingers clumsy with sleep.

Daichi’s car is one of those boxy Grand Cherokees that’s probably older than either of them. It’s got windows you can actually crank down, which strikes Kuroo as quaint. He says as much. Daichi snorts.

“You’re just too young to remember when all cars had these things.”

Kuroo twists around to toss his backpack into the back. “There’s a middle-aged man hidden somewhere inside that virile young body of yours, Sawamura.”

Daichi glances away from the ignition long enough to quirk an eyebrow at Kuroo in response.

Kuroo rolls with it. “I see you moved the shotgun seat all the way back.”

“I figured it’d be the only way your legs would fit.”

“That was very thoughtful of you.” There’s plenty of leg space - enough, even, for Kuroo to kick his feet up onto the dashboard, which he does immediately. “Did you have to move yours all the way up to the front, so your legs could reach the pedals?”

“You know, I can just leave you here.”

Just then, the car rumbles to life. As Daichi backs out of the driveway, Kuroo turns around to examine their setup. The back two rows of seats are folded down, and there’s a neat pile of blankets off to the side that they’ll have to spread out that night.

Their plan is to wander, which suits Kuroo just fine. He’s got an aunt in Kyoto, and one of Daichi’s old teammates offered the floor of his house in Chugoku. Other than that, they’re sleeping in the back of the car. Kuroo has some doubts about fitting all his limbs in the back of the vehicle, but he figures he’s slept in worse places.

A sudden phantom memory washes over him, of all the training camps he spent in the same dorm as Haiba Lev. He shudders a little, and Daichi looks over at him. “Something wrong?”

“Nothing. I was just thinking about Lev.”

“Ah.” Daichi nods in understanding.

They wind through Miyagi. Kuroo watches houses and fields roll by, and little by little, Daichi finishes his coffee and shrugs off the last traces of sleep. Then, just as they’re pulling onto the ramp to the highway, Daichi says quietly, “I missed you, too.”

Without his permission, Kuroo’s heart jumps in his chest.

So of course he has to ruin it. “Getting sentimental in your old age, Sawamura?”

“I take it back,” Daichi says instantly.

“No take-backsies,” Kuroo singsongs, delighted with his situation already. It’s morning, after all, and the highway is empty and the road is theirs.

* * *

“You brought a _ukulele?”_

Kuroo puts on a face of mock offense. “You aren’t a fan of the jams, Sawamura?”

“Well - I would’ve expected a guitar.”

“I can barely fit _myself_ in this seat, Sawamura, not everyone’s built in miniature.”

“Kuroo, I’m five centimeters taller than average.”

“Sorry, what? Couldn’t hear you all the way down there.”

Daichi jerks the wheel into a swerve that slams Kuroo against the passenger door, which is delightfully petty of him. It’s only mid-morning and today is already a great day.

Kuroo leans back in his seat, rests the instrument on his leg. He strums idly for a few minutes, stringing chords together without any real semblance of organization.

“Any requests?” he asks Daichi a few miles later.

“Do you know any John Denver?”

Kuroo half-chuckles. “Haha, actually though.”

Daichi is quiet for a moment. Kuroo looks up, curious - and then his fingers freeze on the strings. “Oh my god, you were serious-”

“Look, if you don’t know any of his songs-”

“Sawamura, you’re such a _dad-”_

Daichi shoots him a sidelong dirty look. “You’re the one whose underclassmen got him a World’s Okayest Dad t-shirt for graduation-”

“And _you’re_ the one I caught belting Ain’t No Mountain High Enough in the showers at training camp that one time-”

“Are you trying to embarrass me? Because I’m not ashamed about that at all-”

Kuroo grins. “Am I gonna make you turn this car around, Dadchi?”

“Are you going to play a song or not?”

Kuroo snickers, but he picks up the ukulele again and hums the tune for a few bars, trying to pick out the chords.

“Almost heaven,” he begins, accent rough around the syllables, “West Virginia…”

He pauses for a moment, and on the next line, Daichi joins in. “Blue Ridge Mountains - Shenandoah River…”

“See, _you_ know all the words too,” Daichi mutters between lines. “And you criticized _me-”_

“LIFE IS OLD THERE,” Kuroo cuts him off pointedly, but when Daichi murmurs “older than the trees,” he quiets down and joins back in at a normal volume.

Daichi sings low and deep, solid and simple in tone. And when they reach the chorus and Kuroo lets his voice soar into a harmony, Daichi keeps the melody steady and reliable below him.

Kuroo falls silent on the last line, leaving Daichi to sing the last “take me home, country roads”. Daichi waits for him to resolve the chord progression, and then glances over. “Do you know the next verse?”

There’s a hint, however subtle, of hopefulness in his voice.

Kuroo grins down at his ukulele and keeps playing.

* * *

When Daichi stirs, he can barely see out of the windows of the car.

At first, the fuzz of cobwebs in his brain convinces him that he’s still asleep, that he’s navigated his dream-car right out into the clouds over the ocean. But then his movement disturbs Kuroo, who mutters in his sleep and throws out a clumsy elbow that lands painfully in Daichi’s side, and yeah, Daichi is definitely awake.

He grumbles a little to himself and fumbles for his phone. Apparently, it’s nearly eleven - without the sun through the windows of the car, he’d slept in. He sends off a quick text to Kuroo’s aunt, telling her they’ll be later than expected, and then cracks open his mom’s cooler.

Kuroo finally sits up when Daichi opens the back doors so he can sit on the tailgate and eat his muffin and banana with his legs dangling. Inside the car, the blankets and the heat of their bodies had kept them warm, but outside, the air has the beginnings of a nip to it. Kuroo shuffles back to sit next to him, still swathed in the blankets. He accepts the muffin Daichi hands him and starts munching at it in silence.

They’d made camp in a park last night, and the forest is blanketed in fog that clings to the trees and hangs low over the ground. As they pass a bottle of orange juice back and forth, the occasional drip of water off the leaves grows more regular and rapid. Finally, Daichi murmurs, “Should get going. It’s starting to rain.”

“Mm,” says Kuroo.

"Not a rain person?”

“Low-pressure systems,” Kuroo explains. “Knock me right out.”

Daichi hops down onto the ground barefoot, shuts the doors behind him, and makes his way around to the driver’s seat. Kuroo, on the other hand, doesn’t even leave the car, instead maneuvering his limbs from the back up into the passenger seat and dragging the blanket with him. He spreads the blanket over his legs and pulls his old Nekoma jacket around his shoulders, hunching his head so far down in the collar that Daichi can barely see any of his face except the haphazard tufts of black hair.

“You good?” Daichi asks as he pulls himself up into the driver’s seat and starts up the car.

Kuroo raises a sleepy hand and waves it vaguely. Daichi takes that as a signal that he won’t be much for conversation this morning.

As they pull onto the road, Kuroo slouches back, legs jumbled up against the dashboard. It doesn’t look comfortable, but within a few minutes on the road, Daichi stops catching Kuroo’s small movements out of the corner of his eye, and his breathing is regular and steady.

Kuroo’s phone is resting in the cupholder, aux cord trailing from it to the stereo. The Spotify playlist on the lock screen is simply titled “rain”, and it’s been crooning music that all blends together - twangy guitar, slow deep voices, gentle piano.

Outside, midday folds thick grey fog and steady rain around them. The highway rumbles by under Daichi’s tires, and inside, the car is cozy and dry and warm. The playlist runs out after about an hour, and after that, Kuroo’s slow, even breathing, the occasional tick of the turn signal when Daichi shifts lanes, and the drumming rain on the old roof are the only sounds.

Daichi glances over at Kuroo.

His lips are slightly parted, his lashes surprisingly long over his angular cheekbones. His hair, of course, is disastrous - dark and messy. His tanned skin is washed lighter in the soft grey light seeping in through the windows. A signpost on the side of the road reads 27 km - to the next city, to the next prefecture, to the end of the road. He doesn’t know, he doesn’t care.

Daichi lifts his right hand off the wheel and gently pushes it into Kuroo’s hair, tangling his fingers in the bedhead.

Kuroo makes a sleepy noise of surprise, but when Daichi pauses, he presses his head up into the cup of Daichi’s palm. Daichi huffs silent amusement, but he resumes stroking Kuroo’s head. Kuroo lets out a tiny kitten-sigh, and curls up again as Daichi’s fingers card slowly through his hair.

“You seem comfortable,” Daichi observes, voice low with amusement over the patter of the rain on the roof.

"I’m bout ready to start purring,” Kuroo mumbles. He sighs happily as Daichi absently scritches at the nape of his neck.

“Furry,” Daichi says mildly.

“Blocked,” Kuroo yawns.

After that, they’re both quiet as the rain and the car roll onwards.

* * *

“...and so I’m still covered in wedding cake, yeah, and Bokuto’s gotten us kicked out of every bakery in the southeastern Tokyo area-”

“Oh my _god-”_

“-and I think folks are starting to figure out that neither of us is actually getting married, because next thing we know there’s this massive brick wall of a baker storming around the neighborhood with a rolling pin asking if anybody’s seen two tall college students with weird hair and wedding cake all over them-”

“I don’t suppose you _took down your hair_ or anything reasonable like that-”

“Of course not, dude, we have a _look -_ so anyway, we can’t go into any bathrooms to clean up because everybody knows that the scary baker is out for blood, _but_ someone’s Labrador retriever is leashed to a bench nearby-”

_“Ohhhh-”_

“-and so we spend, like, fifteen minutes sitting there on the sidewalk with this strange Labrador retriever licking cake off our faces before we can make our getaway.”

“That’s a great way to spend your time,” Daichi sighs. “I would’ve just stayed there after the cake was gone.”

Kuroo rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, you and dogs, whatever. You’d be singing a different tune if you’d seen the size of that baker.”

“You were there this morning, when we ran into that lady and Joey at the park,” Daichi reminds him. “You know how I feel about Labrador retrievers.”

“Yeah, but I don’t think - wait.” Kuroo blinks. “That was this morning? It feels like ages ago.”

Daichi glances sidelong at him. “Time goes slower on the road, haven’t you noticed?”

Kuroo’s brow furrows, and then he frowns down at the dashboard. “Wait. How many days have we been gone?”

Daichi just shrugs. “Does it matter?”

“Awfully casual of you, Sawamura.”

Daichi tilts his head sideways and treats Kuroo to a small smile. “Time flies when the company’s good, you know.”

Kuroo opens his mouth, squeaks a little, and closes it again. Daichi’s laughter floats out of the cranked-down windows and whips into the wind down the empty road behind them.

* * *

They find their way to some tiny fishing village, a ramshackle hamlet clinging to the steep, rocky mountainside that plunges down to the dilapidated fishing boats bobbing in the harbor. The sun is already long by the time Daichi’s car rolls into town. The main, and only, street has a cluster of a few buildings - a gas station with one working pump, a tavern (serving mostly seafood, of course), a general store with rocking chairs on the porch.

They stop for gas first. Kuroo heads into the station to pick them up some cold sodas, and Daichi coaxes the pump into producing gasoline. When he’s finished fueling up, he looks up to see Kuroo standing at the edge of the lot, silhouetted by the sunset, with his hands planted on his hips. He’s staring at the tavern next door, and his shoulders are unmistakably weary.

Daichi heads over to stand next to him. “Is something wrong?”

Silently, Kuroo raises a hand and points at the sign hanging over the entrance to the tavern. Daichi squints at it through the long sunset, and then starts shaking with chuckles.

“‘Just Squidding’,” Kuroo says aloud. “It’s called ‘Just Squidding’.” Daichi snickers louder, and Kuroo heaves an enormous sigh. “Have I ever told you your sense of humor is _terrible?”_

“Remember that time you snorted 7-Up out your nose and leaked snot for ten minutes because Bokuto called Ushijima ‘dat boi’?”

“Shut up,” Kuroo says instantly. Daichi barks a satisfied laugh. “That was _funny.”_

“It _definitely_ wasn’t.”

“Okay, it was funnier than _Just Squidding-”_

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Daichi tells him. “We can go there for dinner. Pay for it with money out of my _octopurse.”_

Kuroo gives him a sulfurous look.

Daichi spreads his hands in a placating gesture. “Well, if you can think of any better fish puns, just-”

_“Don’t-”_

“-let _minnow.”_

“I can’t believe this,” Kuroo says to the sunset.

“Or we could go somewhere else - Just Squidding smells so good, there has to be some kind of… _catch.”_

Kuroo stomps off in the direction of the car. Daichi follows and starts up the car, radiating smugness as Kuroo seethes next to him.

They park the car in a tiny broken-seashell lot that looks out over the harbor. As they walk back into town, Daichi begins,

“If you’re upset about the food there, you could go see the manager.”

“…”

“He can talk to you in his of _fish.”_

"I hate you,” Kuroo mutters. “Did it take you that long to think of that one?”

“You can’t rush genius, Kuroo.”

Name aside, Just Squidding is delicious. The menu is simple and the rafters are rough-hewn, but the freckled teenage waitress promises that it’s her great-grandma’s recipe and that the fish is so fresh it’ll practically flop around on their plates. Kuroo looks a little queasy at that, which Daichi thinks is hilarious, but he doesn’t complain when she brings out a plateful of shrimp that smells good enough to wake the dead. And after they’re done with the food in their booth, they move to the bar, downing beers elbow to elbow with a rowdy crowd of leathery-faced fishermen who smell like brine and the sun.

They don’t leave until the bar is nearly trickled out and the calloused hands of the bartender hustle them out the door with friendly gruffness. As they stumble down the street towards the car, Daichi’s listening to Kuroo’s laughter - how when he’s drunk, it all slurs together, loud wheezy belly laughs melting into hiccupy chuckles that keep interrupting the few bumpy sentences he manages to get out before he dissolves into helpless giggles again.

“And that guy was all up in my face, and all I could think to say was he clearly has a serotonin deficiency if he was talking to me like that, and there went my designated driver-”

“Like you’re one to talk - you called _me_ to drag your drunk ass home in the middle of finals week-”

“Yeah? But now _you’re_ the one who’s drunk in the middle of nowhere - _shameful,_ Sawamura-”

He’s a pain in the ass, but Daichi’s laughing too when he says, “You’re drunk too, shut up-”

Kuroo pauses on the sidewalk and turns to stare Daichi down, eyes dancing with mischief. Slowly, clearly, he says, “Make. Me.”

 _“Fine,”_ says Daichi, because there’s really only one way to respond to that.

Kuroo’s tall, though, so Daichi has to step in and yank him down by the front of his t-shirt.

When he draws back, Kuroo’s eyes are blown wide.

“I - I didn’t actually expect-”

“You,” Daichi says drily, “are nowhere _near_ as subtle as you think you are.”

“Oh,” Kuroo croaks.

Daichi kisses him again, and this time Kuroo responds. When Daichi draws Kuroo’s lower lip between his teeth and then releases it, Kuroo tips his head back, and Daichi’s lips whisper down his neck. Kuroo’s eyes flutter shut as Daichi’s teeth close at the crook of his collarbone, and a soft gasp breaks out of his mouth as Daichi sucks a dark red mark into his skin.

“Oh?” Daichi murmurs, letting go for a moment. His hands creep up between them, thumbs sliding under the hem of Kuroo’s t-shirt to rub slow circles into the jut of his hipbones.

“The,” Kuroo says, with difficulty. “The car.”

“The car,” Daichi repeats.

Right. They’re standing in the middle of the road.

They start weaving back down the street again. Daichi’s fingers curl against the inside of

Kuroo’s thin wrist, securing the grip he doesn’t remember taking. To guide him, of course.

They manage to get all the way back to the car without touching each other more than that. But once they’re there, footsteps crunching across the broken seashell lot, Kuroo tugs open the back doors of the car and hoists himself up to sit on the tailgate, legs dangling as he watches Daichi. In the starlight, his eyes are shining.

“You know, I know I’m heart-stoppingly attractive,” he says, “but I wouldn’t have expected _this.”_

In the moment it takes Daichi to process that, Kuroo starts cackling. Daichi’s whirling head tilts towards incredulity. “Get _back_ here-”

Before he can think twice about it, he lunges out and catches firm hold of Kuroo’s ankle. Kuroo freezes. His laughter cuts off into strangled silence.

In slow motion, Daichi slides his hand up Kuroo’s calf. His fingers linger, and without really thinking about it, he takes hold of Kuroo’s thighs and gently pushes them apart so he can step between them. Brow furrowed, he stares down at Kuroo sprawled open under him.

Carefully, deliberately, Daichi lifts his hand and smooths it across the oddly soft skin of Kuroo’s inner thigh. Kuroo shudders head to toe. Daichi’s gaze settles heavy on the coil of Kuroo’s muscles at his touch.

“We should. Um. We should,” says Kuroo.

“Should…?” Daichi echoes, only half attentive. He wants to see Kuroo shiver like that again. He also wants to see if the rest of Kuroo’s legs are soft too, and so he slides his fingers up to the hems of Kuroo’s shorts and pushes them higher, watching the way the fabric bunches up. Underneath him, Kuroo trembles.

“Um,” says Kuroo. His voice cracks like a fourteen-year-old. Vaguely, Daichi registers that he should remember that, to tease Kuroo about later. “Uh.”

“Should,” Daichi reminds him. Kuroo must have forgotten what he was saying, which is reasonable, because Daichi is having a hard time remembering anything but Kuroo and starlight right now.

“Right. Should.” Kuroo draws in a deep breath and sits up. “Should maybe not do this now. When we’re drunk. Which we are.”

“Okay,” Daichi says, very slowly. “Okay.”

Yes. This makes sense.

He climbs up next to Kuroo on the tailgate. Kuroo reaches over and takes his hand - surprisingly chaste - and then draws him inside, closes the doors behind them. As soon as Daichi lies down, his head starts reeling like a shaken-up snowglobe, Kuroo curls up, facing him. His eyes are wide and luminous in the darkness.

Daichi doesn’t realize he’s drifting until the only thing he can focus on is the gleam of Kuroo’s eyes across from him, and then darkness.

* * *

Technically, Daichi hasn’t woken up _alone_ since he left Miyagi, but this is the first time he’s woken up _quite_ so not-alone. Kuroo is wrapped around him like a gangly adolescent octopus. When attempting to pry him off doesn’t work, Daichi reaches around and digs his fingers into Kuroo’s ribs. Kuroo squawks and practically hits the ceiling of the car, slamming the crown of his head painfully into Daichi’s chin on the way, but at least he’s awake.

Once his feathers are smoothed, Kuroo leans up and lands a sloppy kiss on the corner of Daichi’s mouth, then the tip of his nose, then full on his lips. Daichi allows this for a moment, and then tries to wriggle out from underneath him. “Let me up, you ass, I’m hungry.”

“Nope,” says Kuroo, so smug Daichi can practically see feathers on his lips. “This is more important.”

“You’re so _clingy,”_ Daichi complains.

But he does tilt his head to kiss back, and he does let Kuroo climb into his lap like he’s an affectionate housecat instead of a 6’1 adult man. And when they finally hit the road, Daichi drives one-handed so he can link his fingers with Kuroo’s on the console.

So that’s a thing now.

Unfortunately, the _kissing_ thing doesn’t seem to stop Kuroo from raising his own particular brand of hell. (Not that Daichi really had high hopes.) Because when they pass a sign that reads SWIMMING HOLE, 1KM, Kuroo jolts up like he’s been electrocuted.

"Daichi,” he says.

“No,” says Daichi instantly.

_“Daichi.”_

“We don’t have bathing suits.”

“We can go skinny dipping, come on, we’ve seen each other’s junk before-”

“Name _one_ reason-”

“It’s _summer,”_ Kuroo reminds him.

“It’s September. I think.”

_“Summer.”_

But it’s Kuroo, and so before a kilometer has passed, Daichi is worn down. When he shifts into the Exit Only lane, Kuroo pumps his fist with delight, and then yelps with pain as he accidentally punches the ceiling of the car, which makes it fully worth it that Daichi has given in.

The road in is bumpy with rocks and old tire tracks. They park in a gravel lot half-grown over with weeds, and walk the rest of the way down to the shore. Kuroo’s the one who strips down first, cocking a lecherous eyebrow at Daichi’s eye-roll - but when they’ve picked their way down to the end of the old wooden dock, Daichi’s the one who points across the lake and asks “hey, do you see that?”, watches one of the most intelligent people he know fall for the oldest trick in the book, and shoves Kuroo in without ceremony, cackling with delight at his surprised squawk.

Later that night, Daichi’s restocking their cooler at the general store a mile down the road when he gets the text from Kuroo.

From: **Kuroo Tetsurou**  
_9:18 P.M.  
_ hey come down to the river

To: **Kuroo Tetsurou**  
_9:19 P.M.  
_ What, right now?

From: **Kuroo Tetsurou**  
_9:20 P.M.  
_ yeah its really important

To: **Kuroo Tetsurou**  
_9:22 P.M.  
_ Alright, I’ll be there in a few. Still at the store.

He’d left in the dusk, but by the time he gets back, it’s fully nighttime outside. Darkness envelops the road and settles into deeper shadows where trees loom, but the night is anything but sinister as it hums with life. Cicadas buzz loudly, small animals rustle through the underbrush, and the familiar lapping of water at the riverbank is a backdrop to the crunch of Daichi’s sneakers on the broken-seashell path down to the water.

As he approaches the river, the crescent moon reflects enough off the slow water to illuminate Kuroo’s long, lanky body stretched out on his back on the old wooden dock. He looks up at the tap of Daichi’s steps, and his crooked grin stretches across his face.

“Hey, you,” Kuroo greets him, smile curling around the lazy words. He pats the dock next to him, and Daichi drops down cross-legged, facing towards the flowing river. Kuroo props himself up on his elbows and watches Daichi through half-hooded eyes. His t-shirt hangs distractingly off his shoulders.

“So what’s so important?” Daichi asks idly, not really concerned with the answer. The slow, even rock of the dock beneath them, the cool breeze off the river, and the way Kuroo’s fingers are tracing circles into the leg of his jeans just above his knee have already combined to lull him into relaxation.

Kuroo grins and jerks his chin upwards. “Didn’t you notice?”

Daichi tips his head back and looks.

“Oh.”

Across the night sky, the stars are blazing brighter than he’d ever seen before, brilliant pinpricks of light strewn across the night sky. Closer to the two boys, the scene’s doubled in the rippling surface of the river. If they were to slide off the dock and into the water now, they’d be floating in starlight.

“There’s a lot more of them out here,” Daichi says softly. “Away from civilization, I mean.”

Kuroo’s head is tilted back too, and the moonlight casts the lines of his neck into sharp relief. “It’s different when you’re not driving through it, right?” he asks, and Daichi nods. As much as he loves the hush that falls over the car late at night, when the sky is huge and dark and alive, there’s something vaguely wondrous about sitting still and unafraid in the face of the cosmos.

Present company helps, too.

Kuroo’s long, thin fingers are still resting on his knee, and it’s the most natural thing in the world when Daichi’s own shorter, broader ones slide down to cover them. For a moment, there's comfortable silence.

“Are you cold?” Daichi asks, noticing suddenly that Kuroo is shivering slightly. The heat of the day left the dock pleasantly warm underneath them, but the air is chilly, and Kuroo’s skinny form doesn’t have much in the way of insulation.

“Mm, it’s not too bad. Wouldn’t say no to being warmed up, though.” Kuroo’s voice is low and husky, and past his lidded eyelids and quirked smile, his gaze is piercing.

“How do you suggest I do that?” Daichi asks, playful, and Kuroo pushes himself up off the dock to sit up straight.

“I have a few ideas,” he murmurs, and leans forward.

Daichi meet him halfway, kissing back soft and warm. On his leg, their fingers twine together, and against his lips, Kuroo’s smile widens into a grin.

When they break apart, Kuroo starts chuckling. Daichi’s head is swimming, but he still has the capacity to frown at him. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing, nothing.” Kuroo’s laugh is breathless and exhilarated, and he bends his head to bump it against Daichi’s shoulder. “It’s just. I’ve kind of liked you since that first training camp.”

“Are you serious,” says Daichi.

“I know, right? We could have spent all this time kissing-”

“This _whole time-”_

“-and, like, Bokuto would always tell me to go for it, but I was dead convinced you were dating your vice captain, so I-”

 _“Kuroo,”_ Daichi interrupts. Kuroo falls silent. Daichi takes a deep breath. “Will you be my boyfriend?”

Kuroo answers by cupping Daichi’s face in his hands and kissing him once, twice, three times.

“Is that a yes?” Daichi prompts, just to make sure, and Kuroo grins and tackles him backwards onto the dock, pressing more and more enthusiastic kisses that land haphazardly on Daichi’s nose and cheeks and eyelids. Daichi, half-amused half-indignant, manages to get his arms around the taller boy and flip the two of them over so that Kuroo’s the one pinned down beneath him, and Kuroo starts laughing again as Daichi kisses the crook of his neck. Then his hands are on Daichi’s hips, and he’s rolling them over again and leaning down to-

Suddenly, there’s no more wood underneath Daichi’s back, and Kuroo curses in surprise, grasping futilely at the dock before two bodies land in the dark water with one _sploosh._ Daichi surfaces first, gasping and spluttering, and grabs onto the dock with one hand, pawing around himself for Kuroo’s lanky limbs with the other. His search is rewarded when said limbs wrap around him from behind and a cold, wet mouth starts kissing the back of his neck.

Daichi swats halfheartedly at the mop of flattened black hair with his free hand as they bob up and down in the water. “You’re really insatiable, aren’t you?”

“I’ve been waiting a while for this,” Kuroo mumbles against his skin. “Cut me some slack.”

Daichi does him one better and turns Kuroo around so they can kiss properly. And if he pokes merciless fun between kisses at how much Kuroo looks like a soaked kitten with his hair down until Kuroo’s sputtering and hot-cheeked, well, that’s beside the point, isn’t it.

“That’s a yes, by the way,” Kuroo says after they’ve hoisted each other out of the water and laid themselves out on their backs to dry off on the dock.

Daichi snorts, reaches over to tangle his fingers with Kuroo’s. “I figured.”

* * *

The next morning, they’ve only been on the road for an hour when Daichi’s car slows, and then stops. Kuroo pauses in the middle of a story about the time Lev learned Wonderwall on guitar to look over at Daichi, curious.

“We ran out of highway,” Daichi says, face oddly blank.

“We what?”

Daichi gestures out the windshield. The highway has narrowed into a two-lane road, with pavement that’s barely past gravel and lines faded to little more than discolorations on the road. “We ran out of highway.”

Daichi gets out of the car. Kuroo unfolds himself from the passenger seat and follows. They aren’t near enough to the coast to hear the waves, but there’s still salt on the breeze. And the road ahead is winding its way through tough, rippling seagrass.

Daichi leans against the car’s grill and fishes his phone out of his pocket. Kuroo hops up onto the hood, sitting cross-legged and closing his eyes to enjoy the sun.

“Off,” Daichi instructs him without looking up. “You make a bad hood ornament.”

Kuroo, being Kuroo, flutters his eyelashes and leans back on his elbows to stick his right leg straight up in the air. At Daichi’s utter lack of reaction, he puts his leg back down and asks, “Where are we?”

“Uhhhhh.” Daichi pulls up Google Maps. It takes a moment to load, and then-

“Oh,” says Daichi.

Kuroo leans over to prop his chin on Daichi’s shoulder, peering down at the screen. “Oh,” he echoes.

They’re about to cross the narrow strip of land into Fukuoka. After that-

“Further south than this, there’s no more highway,” Daichi says. “Only backroads.”

“Well,” says Kuroo. “We could turn around.” He makes no effort to hide his lack of enthusiasm.

Daichi is quiet for a moment.

But when Kuroo looks up at him, his mouth is suspiciously tight - and his eyes are twinkling.

Kuroo's lips curve into a full-blown grin in response.

“That’s what I thought.”

* * *

As they’re dozing off that evening, Kuroo mumbles, “Daichi.”

“Mmm?”

“We should get a dog.”

“We’re both in university,” Daichi points out.

“A cat?” Kuroo suggests, words a little slurred together. “Even if not a dog, we _definitely_ need a cat.”

Abruptly, Daichi stops stroking Kuroo’s wild hair and moves his hand away from Kuroo’s head in his lap.

 _“Hey,”_ Kuroo protests. He raises his head a little and bumps it into the palm of Daichi’s hand. When Daichi still doesn’t move, Kuroo turns over onto his back and frowns in disapproval up at his boyfriend. _“Daichi.”_

With a sigh, Daichi acquiesces and starts scritching behind Kuroo’s ears. Kuroo makes a delighted noise and snuggles in closer to the crook of Daichi’s hip. “I’m _ninety-nine percent_ sure I already have a cat.”

“I’ve been to your house. You don’t.”

“Have you seen my car, though?” Daichi deadpans.

“What’s that supposed to mean? Hey - _ow!”_ Kuroo squawks as Daichi flicks his nose. “What was that for?!”

“Never mind, never mind.”


End file.
